peppers {stuffed}

I love stuffed vegetables. Tomatoes with rice, peppers with cheese, eggplants with anything. Give me a vegetable and I will stuff it.

Stuffed vegetables are pretty common in Rome. Zucchini stuffed with meat and rice, then cooked in a tomato sauce is one of my favorite trattoria dishes. Every so often you also see stuffed peppers. But they are almost always either red or yelllow, and the stuffing is more of a bread crumb topping than a real honest to goodness stuffing.
 
One of the best peppers that show up in markets in Rome during the summer are frigitelli. I think they are also becoming more popular in the States and the UK these days (Carmen in the US, Romana in the UK). Smaller than bell peppers, they have a much thinner skin and barely any seeds. That’s why they are almost always eaten whole in Rome, quickly fried in a pan which gives them their name, frigitelli.

For some reason they are always harvested and then sold while still green in Italy, giving them that super green pepper bitterness that I guess is more appealing here. In England and the States you tend to see them brilliant red and much sweeter. Either will work with this recipe, and a mix of the two is perfect if you can find them.

Domenico planted about 8 plants of frigitelli in our orto in May, and now we are swimming in the  brightly colored peppers, mostly green but a few starting to turn red as well. While we’ve been eating them fried, I couldn’t resist stuffing them. Even though they are kind of fiddly to play around with .

The stuffing was mostly a dried up bit of whole grain bread from Roscioli that Domenico brought out from Rome one day. The seasoning was garlic, olives, red pepper and cheese. An egg made it all come together.

After I lopped off the tops of the peppers (which also took care of the few seeds) I just wiggled the stuffing into each pepper, pushing it in with my fingers. I got so good at it, that I sort of over did it. I definitely over stuffed the peppers, since the stuffing expanded out of the tops as they cooked.

But actually, I kind of liked that. The ‘tops’ of the stuffing that were sticking out got kind of crispy. And who doesn’t like a bit of cheesy crispy garlicky bread on top of their stuffed pepper?

 
stuffed peppers
(serves 2)

10 frigitelli or romano peppers
2 cups stale whole wheat bread, torn into bits
3 cloves garlic, chopped finely
2 hot peppers, chopped
1 tsp salt
1/2 cup grated pecorino or parmigiano
1/3 cup pitted green or black olives
1/4 cup chopped parsley
1 egg
1 tablespoon olive oil plus more for topping

Preheat oven to 350F/ 180C

Chop the top off of each pepper, pulling out the attached seeds.

Mix all of the ingredients for the stuffing in a bowl. Use your hands, and mix well.

Using your fingers and/or a small spoon, stuff each pepper being careful not to break the pepper.

Lay the peppers in an oiled baking pan, in one layer. Drizzle with olive oil, and sprinkle with salt.

Bake for about a half hour to 40 minutes. Serve warm, or at room temperature.